GOP going after AARP?

posted at 11:58 am on April 10, 2011 by Jazz Shaw

The era of transparency has been taking some tricky twists and turns lately, and not all of the focus has been on the federal government. Unions, public broadcasting and others have come under scrutiny. The next subject of investigation, if certain Republicans have their way at least, will be AARP.

House Republican tax-writers want the IRS to investigate whether AARP should lose its tax-exempt status.

In a letter sent to IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman Friday, Reps. Wally Herger (R-Calif.), Dave Reichert (R-Wash.) and Charles Boustany (R-La.) say a recent congressional probe “gave rise to a number of serious concerns regarding AARP’s organizational structure and activities, and it raised questions about whether AARP continues to qualify as a tax-exempt organization under Internal Revenue Service Code (IRC) 501(c)4.”

A 40-page report recently released by the trio of lawmakers accuses AARP of refusing to provide information about its practices.

We can either dance around what we’re supposed to say when politicians get up to activities such as this or we can refuse to pull any punches and just tell it like it is. On the surface, every organization in the nation has to follow the existing rules regarding taxation. If you find tax exempt groups skirting those regulations they need to be brought into line or have their status changed.

But that’s not what’s really going on here, is it?

AARP is huge, with nearly 36 million members, and they’ve been around for so long they’re practically an institution. (Full disclosure: Yes, I’m a member. Yes, I think they provide some terrific services and programs.) And they’re operating pretty much as they always have. But a number of prominent Republican leaders are still upset that AARP supported Obamacare. And it’s been made clear already that AARP isn’t going to sign on for any major cuts or restructuring in Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security if seniors view it as endangering the benefits they receive or those still to come to their grandchildren. So now the GOP is considering taking the whip to them.

AARP is probably a lot more leery of playing ball on any entitlement changes this year. The last time they endorsed a move to make changes to one of the programs nearly 50,000 of their members quit in protest and they were left to deal with the backlash. It’s not just a “third rail” for politicians.

This is one tactic which the Republicans should look long and hard at before moving forward. If they wish to ride the white stallion of purity and say they simply want all non-profits to follow the law, then fine. It’s a noble sentiment, but they had better be ready to pay the price. Politically it looks like a suicide play. In case the leadership needs reminding, seniors vote at a more consistent rate than any other age group, and they are also the demographic group most likely to skew conservative and vote Republican. And for the most part, they like AARP.

A Republican attack on AARP for blatantly obvious partisan, political reasons could blow up in their faces. And doing this would probably just open the door for their opponents to begin calling for similar “purity driven” investigations of other non-profit groups who Republicans might not be so excited to go after, such as the Chamber of Commerce. Oh, wait… it’s already happening.

Gee, Jazz, I wonder why the Republicans are evilly and cruelly attacking AARP. After all, AARP is fair and nonpartisan. But hey, you know how Republicans hate old people, because Republicans never get old, so they don’t have to worry about old people.

Oh wait, maybe it was the fact that they shilled for ObamaCare while standing to make billions of dollars. Maybe it’s the fact that, just like lots of other non-partisan organizations, they’re liberal hacks. You know, like Planned Parenthood. Gee, Jazz, why are those evil Republicans picking on Planned Parenthood?

I’m not sure what’s more shocking, the author’s apparent ignorance of the role that the AARP serves by working as an arm of the democratic party, or the fact that the AARP is about as Non-Profit as as a labor union.

The problem with this article is that it’s based on a premise that the AARP is not acting in bad faith as a “non-profit”

I believe that premise is false, and furthermore though I do not recall having ever read anything by this author, the ignorance displayed is disurbing to me from the perspective of wondering who is vetting hot air staff.

I am not a member and I tell them so and why whenever I get one of their mailings! Grow a pair seniors and let them be hurt in the pocket book for all their panderings to the libs/progressives/communists and their ilk and the huge amount they will get from this admin! Talk about unions, aarp is a criminal organ!

Going after the AARP is not the only mean and cruel thing the Republicans are doing. They’re going after the teachers’ unions too, and everybody knows that the teachers’ unions want what’s best for the children. The Republicans HATE teachers! Why?!

I refused to join them when eligible and when AMAC was instituted, joined them…Assoc of Mature American Citizens. They are growing, are based on conservative principles and beliefs and have pretty much the same deals that that commie org has. Check them out.

Going after the AARP is not the only mean and cruel thing the Republicans are doing. They’re going after the teachers’ unions too, and everybody knows that the teachers’ unions want what’s best for the children. The Republicans HATE teachers! Why?!

Why be a Republican when they’re so eeevil?

misterpeasea on April 10, 2011 at 3:56 PM

Since you brought up Public Employee Unions, take a look at what the DROP program is. It’s a program that allows retirees at the tender age of 42 years to “retire” with full benefits including pension and healthcare. Once “retired”, they re-apply and are re-integrated into their old tenured positions and can have more than double retirement pension and bennies at the tender age of 54.

Not a bad deal for being an oppressed slave with the American Taxpayer paying for all of it. Not a bad deal at all.

So they may be a tool of O’s administration by lending their name to the ObamaCare cause, they may support widening the medicare gap, they’re unscrupulos and lie to their membership….but hey, they saved me $6.00 at Disneyland…..?

That is hilarious. Back in the errrr… I want to say late 60’s and into the mid 70’s the AARP actually had some seniors testing out dog food for its tastiness. My grandmother actually participated for a free AARP card. It was all the rage.

And her comments? “Eh, it wasn’t that bad”
My Grandfather: “WTF, Dorothea”?

Well, Jazz, like I told my mother, if you’re a member of AARP availing yourself of its “terrific services and programs,” you’re part of the problem.

Under the guise of protecting and serving senior citizens, AARP is an organization dedicated solely to its own bottom line. Its tax-exempt status is just more injury piled on top of more insult.

No self-respecting conservative could possibly support this leftist organization particularly after its disgraceful politicking on Medicare Part D and ObamaCare. So which is it? Are you self-loathing or not a conservative?

Under the guise of protecting and serving senior citizens, AARP is an organization dedicated solely to its own bottom line. Its tax-exempt status is just more injury piled on top of more insult.

No self-respecting conservative could possibly support this leftist organization particularly after its disgraceful politicking on Medicare Part D and ObamaCare. So which is it? Are you self-loathing or not a conservative?

I just want to pile on Jazz Shaw for continuing to be a member of AARP. You’re a part of the problem and you’re actively screwing my generation over so you can get $5 off your next meal at Fudruckers, or whatever.

Whenever AARP sends me letters and ‘membership’ cards (I AM NOT that old!), I return them immediately with a note as to why I will never be a member. AND after they shilled for Obamacare, I cancelled my Mom’s membership, too!

Are AARP services so valuable that a conservative would sign on to them? I’ve been tempted, but simply cannot get past the moral stumbling block. Some things I would rather do without.

paul1149 on April 10, 2011 at 12:23 PM

In a one word answer…no. The AARP doesn’t offer anything that you can’t get elsewhere, often for free. They only promote their own insurance for starters, and it’s not that great. Their so-called discounts can be matched at any travel site, often bettered. Their prescription drug plan is the same as many others and not any better or cheaper. The people the AARP claims to help, low income seniors, will do better with state plans and discount cards from retailers, etc. So putting aside their pretense of caring when they are actually out to make money off Medigap policies and drug plans, you don’t need them at all….no matter what Jazz Shaw says.
As for Jazz Shaw, she sounds like shill for the AARP to me. I did alot of research when I retired and came to the conclusion I didn’t need them at all. I suggest she do the same.

If I didn’t know any better I’d think they let him post this drivel just to rile up a bunch of Hot Aryans.
misterpeasea on April 10, 2011 at 4:56 PM
I agree. It increasingly feels like a bit of cheap provocation.

rrpjr on April 10, 2011 at 5:02 PM

I dunno. This one reeks of uninformed apologist squish to me (jazz is the guy you always end up arguing with at a BBQ because he “claims” he’s conservative, and he’s creating the impression that…..well, you know.).

This article, ladies and gentlemen, is why de Tocqueville predicted America’s failure. “(Full disclosure: Yes, I’m a member. Yes, I think they provide some terrific services and programs.)…In case the leadership needs reminding, seniors vote at a more consistent rate than any other age group, and they are also the demographic group most likely to skew conservative and vote Republican. And for the most part, they like AARP.”

In other words, fiscal discipline is all well and good as long as I’ve got mine. The AARP is pro-spending, pro-nationalization, not for ideological reasons, but because they’re on the public tit. Your $16 annual fee isn’t what’s paying for those “terrific services.”

If we really want to cut spending, we have to be willing to kill our own sacred cows, not just bait the liberals by egging NPR. We have to stand for our stated principles, otherwise the pendulum will swing back on schedule — and this time, the clock will break. That means military cuts, irritating NIMBY seniors, and other things that will raise a hue and cry. It goes double for golf course auxiliary clubs like the Chamber of Commerce, which proved itself to be the liberal caricature of the GOP during the bailouts – not against welfare or spending, just welfare and spending on the poor.

De Tocqueville’s bet – that we would destroy ourselves by voting ourselves money to be paid by nebulous “others” – was made by an admirer, and so far we’ve proven him wrong. But the Frenchman’s ghost is still holding his ticket, and (however sorrowfully or belatedly) is still eligible to cash in.

Any conservative that is a member of the AARP needs to have his head examined. They’re support of ObaMaocare was not an aberration, or bought by favorable regulations in it. It was a socialist organization supporting socialist legislation.

I have no clue why this is just coming out. I’m 64 years old and have been refusing AARP letters since I was 55. I’ve even sent them back to them with notes telling them to take me off their mailing list. My point in saying that is I recognized their politics 9 years ago, where have all the smart people been? This is nothing new, if you’ve really looked at their position papers. I wouldn’t say the AARP is a liberal group, per se, they just make their money off of liberal policies so that’s why they support them.

Anyway, I still refuse to join the AARP. I participated in a poll, not long ago, where they asked me about the AARP and I told them they were asking the wrong guy and commenced to tell them what I thought of them. The poll worker said that’s not the first time he’s heard that.

The AARP, like the Dixie Chicks, got into politics when they should have layed low. Now they’ve lost a lot of support, not so much from people who are members, but among people who they’ll need to support them in the future. Bad move AARP, bad move.

This is shocking! I thought Jazz Shaw knew what the heck he was talking about until I read this peice!

Join AMAC instead of AARP. They are a conservative organization and did not back Obamacare. Well, they didn’t have a vested interest either and AARP was the org. that had the government gut Medicar Advantage. Just for that reason alone they ought to go out of business.

…AARP is probably a lot more leery of playing ball on any entitlement changes this year. The last time they endorsed a move to make changes…

Baloney. Absolute, utter, contemptible, lying snot.

AARP supported Obamacare which cut a half trillion from Medicare purely because it knew that killing Medicare Advantage would force seniors like me to buy much MUCH more expensive Medicare add on policies endorsed by AARP. I’ve seen studies showing AARP will make billions off their support for Obamacare.

Lying, dishonest, look the other way while I take your health care away bullsh*t. I will die early because of this dishonest, greedy, senior fleecing organization.

I have ALREADY had my Medicare Advantage canceled last October, and I have had one of my existing doctors refuse to continue to see me as a patient.

And the people that are supporting lying about this and posting crap like this, I hope…well I can’t say what I hope for you, but I do hope it will be slow, cold and painful.

Wow, you’re really well informed, aren’t you Jazz Shaw? By supporting Obamacare, AARP already signed on to cut HALF A TRILLION DOLLARS from Medicare. And they did that not because they believed it served the best interests of their members, but because they knew they’d make BILLIONS for themselves by selling Medigap insurance policies, which their members will now need to buy because of all the cuts to Medicare necessitated by Obamacare.

As for you, Jazz Shaw, you need to buy a clue because you obviously haven’t got one.

Wow! I see all my fellow commenters have taken Jazz to school in the matter of AARP.

Jazz, please read and heed! They are right on this, and you’re not. Please get your RINO butt out of AARP ASAP!

Last year I told my 89-year-old mother about AARP’s shenanigans, and she canceled her (something like 30-year-long) membership and joined AMAC. I will add that the hubster and I are also going to join AMAC when we, um, “come of age”.

If I didn’t know any better I’d think they let him post this drivel just to rile up a bunch of Hot Aryans.

misterpeasea on April 10, 2011 at 4:56 PM

ACK! Not “Hot Aryans”, please! If there had been Internet p r 0 n in the 1930s in Germany… ;-)

I like to think of us as “HAers”, or maybe “Hot Airians” after the Arian heresy (‘cuz being a conservative at all is darn near heresy in some places!)

First, AARP really sux. Anti-conservative, anti-gun, and against most things we here (well, most of us) stand for except making money, only they like making it for themselves, with the aiding and abetting of the gubmint tax code.

Spazz Jazz needs to read here for a little on AARPs politics and motivations.

AARP has been functioning as a money-laundering organization for the Democrats, disguised as an insurance company, for a long time.

As with labor unions, the “members” are “members in name only”: only the management gets to decide where the political money goes…the members have no substantive control. So the organization really DOES NOT “represent” 36 million…it just takes their insurance money.

This was driven home during the first “Medicare Part B” debacle. If you remember, AARP pushed hard to get that plan, which REQUIRED seniors to participate, through. But when the Feds actually started implementing it with seniors’ Social Security money, there was a Senior Revolt…and “Medicare Part B” was hurriedly repealed: AARP “members” DID NOT support this plan, and many quit AARP for working against their interests.

It’s about time that AARP was called to account. They need to account for their actions to their “members”, and they need to account for the money they collect.

PS –
When solicited by AARP, I always return the solicitation in their business reply envelope with the notation: “We do NOT contribute to extreme left-wing lobbying organizations”!!